Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship

In 2013, UC Irvine began funding the Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Program (CAPFP). Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellows are selected from the pool of applicants who identified mentors at UC Irvine and submitted their applications to the University of California President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship Program.

About

Criteria: Candidates who will contribute to diversity in higher education through their teaching, research or service and who will have a doctorate awarded by the start of the appointment on July 1 of the year following their applications.

Application Deadline: November 1st each year. For 2019, extended to November 8, 2019Faculty Mentor and Reference Letters Deadline: December 1st each year.

The Program: The UCI Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Program for Academic Diversity offers postdoctoral research fellowships and faculty mentoring to qualified scholars in all fields whose research, teaching, and service will contribute to the diversity and equal opportunity at the University of California. These contributions may include public service addressing the needs of our increasingly diverse society, efforts to advance equitable access to higher education for women and minorities, or research focusing on underserved populations or understanding issues of racial or gender inequalities. The program is seeking applicants with the potential to bring to their academic careers the critical perspective that comes from their non-traditional educational background or understanding of the experiences of members of groups historically underrepresented in higher education. Participants in both the President’s and Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Program are eligible for the University of California Hiring Incentive. Learn more about UCOP’s announcement for the hiring incentive program and UCI’s participation.

Awards and Tenure: Awards will be made to applicants who show promise for tenure-track appointments on the Irvine campus. The Fellowship will be for one year, in residence at the Irvine campus. Each award is for a 12-month period in residence. One-year awards for 2020-2021 are anticipated to begin July 1, 2020, and will end on June 30, 2021, regardless of start date.

Salary: The annual award provides an annual salary of $49,200. The award also includes health insurance, vision and dental benefits, four weeks paid time off and up to $5,000 for research-related and program expenses.

Eligibility: Applicants must receive a Ph.D. from an accredited university before the start of their fellowship. Successful applicants must present documents demonstrating that they are legally authorized to work in the United States without restrictions or limitations. Individuals granted deferred action status under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program are encouraged to apply.

Application Process: All applicants for the UCI Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Program should submit their application to the University of California President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship Program. The mentor’s letter should address the department’s future hiring plans and the applicant’s potential for appointment at University of California. Applications must be completed online by November 1 (extended to November 8 for 2019).

Awards will be announced in March. Inquiries regarding the program may be directed to Associate Director Roxane Cohen Silver at rsilver@uci.edu.

Current Fellows

Dr. Anne Therese Frederiksen

University of California, San Diego

Ph.D. in Linguistics and Cognitive Science, 2019

Anne Therese Frederiksen researches referential cohesion in the signed and spoken modalities. Prior to joining UC Irvine, she earned a PhD from the University of California, San Diego and a BA and MA from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. In 2017, she received a NSF Dissertation Research Grant to complete research on her dissertation on referential cohesion in American Sign Language. This work focused on how Deaf signers use space, syntax, and semantics/pragmatics to make clear who is doing what to whom in the discourse.

At UCI, Dr. Frederiksen is working on code-blending and pronoun processing in sign-speech bimodal bilinguals. Her work examines bidirectional language influences in sign-speech vs. speech-speech bilingual and uses bimodal bilingualism as a lens through which to investigate language processing and cognitive control.

Stefanie Graeter is a cultural anthropologist, broadly interested in ethnographic questions of embodiment, materiality, knowledge, and the political with a geographic focus on Peru and the Americas. Her work draws upon diverse scholarly fields, especially environmental and medical anthropology, science and technology studies, critical race and decolonial studies, and political theory. She completed her Ph.D. in 2015 in sociocultural anthropology at the University of California, Davis with a designated emphasis in critical theory. Her dissertation on Mineral Incorporations: Lead Science, Ethics, and Politics in Central Peru examined how lead toxicity is operationalized politically within social projects that resist––or support–– Peru’s large-scale extractive industries. Peer-reviewed articles of this research have been published in Cultural Anthropology and American Anthropologist.

Dr. Graeter’s emerging book manuscript, Mineral Incorporations, argues that while toxicological sciences deliver ethical weight to public health, human rights, and environmental activism, neoliberal labor reforms in Peru make human exposures to heavy metals a requisite to diverse forms of economic livelihood and collective survival. Through an ethnographic examination of the social and material processes that bring bodies and minerals into relation, the book conceptualizes the contemporary politics of environment/health and labor within noxious environs of racial capitalism and post-anthropocene worlds. New research extends her analysis of toxic materialities and politics into the realms of climate change, agriculture, and gastronomic cultures of Peru. In addition to her scholarship, Dr. Graeter also is an intersex woman and advocate involved in public campaigns to de-pathologize and celebrate intersex bodies and their social existence.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic: The science of toxicity and chemical relationships within extractive economies, food cultures, and political mobilizations of Peru

Mentor: Dr. Kim Fortun

Department, School: Department of Anthropology, School of Social Sciences

Elizabeth Hemming-Schroeder’s research is focused on using genomics to study malaria epidemiology. She completed her Ph.D. in 2018 in biological sciences at UCI. For her dissertation on Landscape Genetics of African Malaria Parasite and Its Vectors, she used techniques in population genetics and spatial statistics to study the spatial spread of malaria parasites and mosquitoes in Kenya. Her current project aims to incorporate Big Data and machine learning algorithms to further improve our understanding of malaria epidemiology and antimalarial drug resistance spread, with the goal of informing malaria control and antimalarial drug resistance containment programs. Through her research, she has mentored several undergraduate students in independent research projects, seven of whom contributed to and were co-authors on published manuscripts. Many of her research mentees have gone on to pursue higher education, such as medical and pharmacy school, and others have pursued careers in industry and public health. In addition, she has been a mentor for the UCI LGBTQ Mentoring Program since 2013 with the goal of helping LGBTQ students develop a positive self-identity.

John Marquez is a historian of Brazil, Latin America, and the Atlantic world, specializing in the colonial era. His interests include the histories of slavery, diaspora, law, empire, and race. More broadly, both through teaching and research, he is interested in exploring the cultures and histories of Latin America through a “global” lens.

Dr. Marquez received his Ph.D. in History from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign in 2019, where he completed a dissertation titled, Freedom’s Edge: Enslaved People, Manumission, and the Law in the Eighteenth-Century South Atlantic World. In the dissertation, he explored the lives and experiences of enslaved people who engaged with the legal system to achieve their manumission, or legal freedom. Based on research in Brazil and Portugal, the dissertation offered a trans-Atlantic history of enslaved peoples’ struggles to gain their freedom and charted the indelible marks they left on conceptions of freedom, the law, and colonial slavery itself. Dr. Marquez’s research has been funded by fellowships from the Fulbright-Hays, the Conference on Latin American History, and the Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities. As a Chancellor’s Advance Postdoctoral Fellow, he is excited to begin the process of revising his dissertation into a book manuscript and contributing more broadly to the academic community at UC Irvine.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic: Freedom’s edge: Slavery, manumission, and empire in Brazil and the South Atlantic world

Ph.D. in Cultural Studies, with an emphasis in Feminist Theory and Research, 2019

Diana Pardo Pedraza is an ethnographer of contemporary Colombia interested in researching (de)militarized rural ecologies, post-conflict politics and economics, and multispecies relations of aid and care. She received her M.A. in cultural studies from the Universidad de los Andes, and her Ph.D. in cultural studies at the University of California, Davis, with a designated emphasis in feminist theory and research.

Her doctoral dissertation, Trust in Scales: Humanitarian Demining and Peace Laboratories in Rural Colombia, addresses rural ecologies of life (and death) as they are occupied by heterogeneous war forces and by the complex political economy of what is termed “post-conflict.” This ethnography is based on two years of fieldwork in the “Pilot Project of Humanitarian Demining,” a peace initiative that brought guerrillas and army soldiers together to work in the removal of improvised landmines planted in peasant villages during the decades-long war.

Dr. Pedraza’s work is inspired by diverse scholarly fields, especially ethnographic theory, science and technology studies, feminist political ecology, and political theory. Her research has been supported by the Wenner-Gren Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, and the University of California Office of the President.

Kimberly Stanek received her B.S. in biochemistry and B.A. in chemistry from the University at Buffalo in 2012, and her Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Virginia in 2018. Dr. Stanek’s thesis focused on the structure and function of the bacterial chaperone Hfq, which has been linked to numerous pathways including metabolism, cell signaling, and expression of virulence factors. Specifically, she sought to elucidate the evolutionary history of this ubiquitous yet functionally diverse family of proteins. While in graduate school, Dr. Stanek fell in love with crystallography and became heavily involved in the American Crystallographic Association (ACA), co-chairing sessions at their annual conference, writing articles for Reflexion (the ACA quarterly publication), and organizing an x-ray crystallography workshop for high school students. Dr. Stanek joined the lab of Dr. Celia Goulding at UCI in 2018 as a postdoctoral associate, and has since been involved in the executive board of UCI’s Postdoctoral Association as part of their research symposium committee.

Dr. DeWayne Williams completed his undergraduate, M.A., and Ph.D. in psychology at The Ohio State University. His dissertation, completed in 2017 with a focus on psychophysiology, was on Ethnicity, Sex, and Vagal Activity: Differences in Hemodynamics Underlying Long-Term Blood Pressure Regulation. Dr. Williams also completed two years of post-doctoral training at The Ohio State University, and will complete his final year of training here at UCI for the 2019-2020 academic year. Dr. Williams’ research broadly examines health psychology with a focus on psychophysiological mechanisms underpinning inhibition, and how deficiencies in such mechanisms can impact self-regulatory abilities and overall mental and physical well-being. Dr. Williams’ research also works to better understand how ethnic differences in baseline physiological activity may negatively contribute to health disparities found between African and European Americans.

Dr. Williams currently has 24+ publications and is first author on 14 of these publications in scientific journals that include: Brain, Behavior, and Immunity;Psychophysiology; and Ethnicity and Health. Dr. Williams has received various research/travel awards and grants throughout his research career, such as the American Psychosomatic Society 2018 Young Investigators Colloquium Award and The Ohio State University Department of Psychology Research Award.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic: Ethnic differences in cardiac-autonomic activity, and how such differences may interact with psychological phenomena and negatively impact health in African Americans

Mentors: Drs. Roxane Cohen Silver and Julian Thayer

Department, School: Department of Psychological Sciences, School of Social Ecology

Salvador Zárate received his Ph.D. in 2017 from the Department of Ethnic Studies at UC San Diego. His dissertation, Invisible Bodies, Devalued Labor: Contract, Reproductive Labor, and the U.S. Sunbelt, 1900-1963, won the American Studies Association’s 2018 Ralph Henry Gabriel Prize for Best Dissertation. Zárate is currently finishing his book manuscript, The Social Life of Plants: Black and Latina Reproductive Laborers in the U.S. Sunbelt, 1921-1963, which examines agriculture and extractive plant-based industries during the Jim Crow era by centering the labor histories of Latina and Black women reproductive laborers in ecological zones of exclusion, such as turpentine camps in Northwest Florida and cotton fields in the San Joaquin Valley. In addition, he has published on the residential gardening economy of Orange County, which he worked from his childhood to well-into his Ph.D. career. His reviews, essays, and creative works have appeared in Aztlán: A Journal of Chicana and Chicano Studies, Anthropology and Humanism, and Cultural Anthropology.

Dr. Zárate was a Ford Fellow in the Department of African American Studies at UCI during 2018-19.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic: The social life of plants: Black and Latina reproductive laborers in the U.S. Sunbelt, 1921-1963

Mentor: Dr. Jonathan Alexander

Department, School: Department of Gender and Sexuality Studies, School of Humanities

Jenny Zenobio earned her Ph.D. in environmental chemistry in 2019 from Purdue University working under the direction of Dr. Linda Lee while her research work was performed at Harvard University in collaboration with Dr. Chad Vecitis. Her research background reflects an interdisciplinary framework combining engineering, toxicology, chemistry, and nanotechnology.

Her dissertation on Abiotic Reduction Perfluoroalkyl Acids by nNi0Fe0-Activated Carbons focused on in-situ technologies for degrading Perfluoroalkyl acids (PFAAs). She developed nanoparticles for abiotic remediation of PFAAs-contaminated groundwater at military sites with minimal adverse impacts.

She earned her Master of Science in the area of environmental toxicology from the Department of Forestry and Natural Resources at Purdue University in 2014 and her B.S. in sanitary engineering from the National University of Engineering in Lima, Peru in 2007.

Former Fellows

2018-2019

Dr. Daniel Akwahboah

Ohio State UniversityDoctor of Philosophy in Chemistry, 2017

Dr. Daniel Akwaboah was born in Ghana, West Africa. He moved to the United States and later obtained his B.S. degree in biochemistry with honors from The Ohio State University in 2011. He was selected as a NIH-funded Chemistry-Biology Interface Program (CBIP) fellow and recently completed his Ph.D. in chemistry at OSU. His graduate work encompasses the successful construction of the C1–C9 and the C10–C25 advanced building blocks of the macrolide core of cytotoxic natural products called amphidinolides C, C2, C3, and Dr. Akwaboah joined Vy Dong’s research group at the University of California, Irvine, in 2018 to pursue his postdoctoral training. His current research is focused on the design and study of transformations that are more green and efficient by using earth abundant catalysts. He is employing transition metal catalysis to access strained biologically relevant carbo- and heterocyclic structural motifs via tandem C–H activation/cyclization strategy.

University of Rome III, ItalyDoctor of Philosophy – Philosophy and Theory of Humanities, 2014

Dr. Anna Boncompagni earned her Ph.D. in philosophy and theory of humanities at the University of Rome III, Italy, after a five-year degree in communication sciences (University of Siena) and a M.A. in theoretical philosophy (University of Florence). In her Ph.D. thesis, she proposed a comparison between the later Wittgenstein’s thought and the pragmatist tradition, focused on their respective ways of conceiving the relationship between knowledge, certainty, and human practices. In her postdoctoral project, she builds on that work, as well as on research in epistemic injustice, with the aim of fostering new light on the nature of prejudice and discriminatory practices. She claims that a form of “hinge epistemology,” derived from the later Wittgenstein’s reflection on the social dimension of doubt and certainty, would help research on epistemic injustice expand its reach toward a more critical conception of knowledge itself.

Dr. Boncompagni has published the monographs Wittgenstein. Lo sguardo e il limite (2012) and Wittgenstein and Pragmatism (2016), besides articles in scientific journals and book chapters for Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, Routledge, and other publishers.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic:
Social Hinge Epistemology: A Proposal for a Critical Approach to Epistemic Injustice

Dr. Bonnie Cuthbert is working in the laboratory of Dr. Celia Goulding to develop a molecular understanding of contact dependent growth Inhibition (CDI) in gram-negative bacteria. CDI+ bacteria are able to inhibit the growth of closely related bacteria through a poorly understood mechanism. Dr. Cuthbert’s research focuses on understanding the initial contact and recognition that initiates CDI and triggers the translocation of a toxin into the target cell. Prior to joining UC Irvine, she completed her Ph.D. in biochemistry at Duke University in 2017 and received her B.A. in biochemistry and molecular biology at Reed College in 2010. Throughout her career, Bonnie has demonstrated a passion for research and education. At UCI, Dr. Cuthbert is working to advance her pedagogical skills by participating in TAP-STEM (Teaching Apprenticeship in STEM), CTEP (Certificate in Teaching Excellence Program) and UCI-GPS-CIRTL (Center for Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning).

University of California, IrvineDoctor of Philosophy in Biological Sciences

Dr. Christian F. Guerrero-Juarez earned his M.S. and Ph.D. in biological sciences from the University of California, Irvine. His dissertation focused on Delineating Mechanisms of Cutaneous Wound Healing and Regeneration in Adults. His current research topic as a Chancellor’s Advance Postdoctoral Fellow in the Departments of Mathematics and Developmental and Cell Biology will focus on predictive multi-scale modeling of skin regeneration. His articles have been published in journals that include Science, Cell, Elife, Journal of Investigative Dermatology, Cell Metabolism and Nature Reviews.

Dr. Stefan Vogler’s research is broadly concerned with the constitutive relationship of law and science and processes of legal and scientific measurement and categorization, particularly in regard to gender and sexuality. His research and teaching interests include gender, sexuality, law, science and knowledge, crime, culture, and feminist and queer theory. He was recipient in 2017 of a Mellon/ACLS Dissertation Completion Fellowship, a Sexualities Project at Northwestern (SPAN) Dissertation Writing Fellowship, and a Martin P. Levine Memorial Dissertation Award from the Sexualities Section of the American Sociological Association.

His dissertation Ruling Sexuality: Law, Expertise, and the Making of Sexual Knowledge, examined how measurement and classification processes were institutionalized in the law. He examined how legal bureaucracies attempted to objectively measure the subjective phenomenon of sexuality for legal decision-making in the United States by juxtaposing two sites where individuals needed to prove their sexualities – in asylum claims by sexual minorities and in risk assessments of sex offenders. His project argued that science and law co-produced sexuality as a regulatory category and cooperated to render sexual subjects legible to, and thus manageable by, the state. These explorations showed that different networks of expertise formed to support competing conceptions of sexuality in each area of law, resulting in divergent ways of understanding sexuality and disparate governance outcomes.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic:
Policing of LGBTQ neighborhoods and interactions between LGBTQ people and police

Mentor:
Dr. Valerie Jenness

Department, School:
Department of Criminology, Law, and Society; School of Social Ecology

University of California, Santa CruzDoctor of Philosophy – Politics, with emphasis in Feminist Studies, 2017

Dr. Sandra Harvey researches the production of race and gender through surveillance technologies originating in colonialism and chattel slavery. Her book manuscript, “Passing for Free, Passing for Sovereign: Blackness and the Formation of the Nation,” traces narratives of race/gender passing within science, settler colonial law, conceptual art, and Enlightenment philosophy. It contextualizes accusations of race/gender passing in the U.S. as rooted in 19th-century surveillance of fugitive slaves and entangled in the above institutions which manage the state’s biopolitical concerns. In this way, she asks after the assumptions about blackness that emerge in the passing regime and how these might influence contemporary notions of freedom, sovereignty, the nation, and the citizen.

Dr. Harvey received her Ph.D. in Politics from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and her research has been supported by the UC Consortium for Black Studies in California and the UCSC Center for Science and Justice.

University of California, Santa BarbaraDoctor of Philosophy-Physics, 2014

Dr. Anna Nierenberg’s research is focused on using gravitational lensing and statistical studies of luminous galaxies to test models of dark matter and galaxy formation. Dr. Nierenberg received her B.S. in physics from UCLA in 2008, and completed her Ph.D. in physics at UCSB in 2014. After finishing her thesis, Dr. Nierenberg received a fellowship to conduct independent postdoctoral research at the Center for Cosmology and AstroParticle Physics, at The Ohio State University. Dr. Nierenberg participates in outreach particularly aimed at middle school and high school aged children, and has appeared in 22 episodes of the YouTube space news show Space in Your Face.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic:
The nature of dark matter and galaxy formation on small scales

Mentor:
Dr. James Bullock and Dr. Michael Cooper

Department, School:
Department of Physics and Astronomy; School of Physical Sciences

Dr. Sarah Aarons has conducted ice core research with a focus in isotope geochemistry, climate change, and paleoclimate. Her previous research used variations in the composition of aerosols (dust, sea salt) preserved in the ice core record to infer variations in the hydrologic cycle, land use change, anthropogenic input, wind trajectories, dominant climate systems, and sea-ice extent. Her current project aims to use sulfur isotopes in the ice core record to reconstruct marine biological activity, atmospheric conditions, and how these vary during major climate transitions. This research may distinguish the sources of climate forcers, and how these forcers interact and fluctuate on glacial-interglacial timescales. She recently completed a Ph.D. in Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Michigan. Prior to that, she earned a master’s degree from the University of Michigan and a Bachelor of Science from Stanford University. In an effort to increase the number of Native Americans in STEM fields, she has participated as a graduate student instructor in a residential summer institute for Native high school students at the University of California, Irvine led by one of her mentors Dr. Kathleen Johnson.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic:
Sulfur isotopes in ice cores: A tracer of atmospheric conditions during major climate changes

Mentor:
Dr. Kathleen Johnson and Dr. Eric Saltzman

Department, School:
Department of Earth System Science; School of Physical Sciences

Where are they now: Dr. Sarah Aarons has accepted a faculty position at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UCSD.

Dr. Tayloria N.G. Adams

Michigan Technological UniversityDoctor of Chemical Engineering, 2014

Dr. Tayloria Adams graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with bachelor’s degrees in Chemical and Life Science Engineering and Applied Mathematics. After completing her undergraduate education, she received the National Consortium for Graduate Degrees for Minorities in Engineering and Sciences (GEM) Fellowship and attended Michigan Technological University (MTU) where she earned a M.S. and Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering. Her doctoral research examined human mesenchymal stem cells’ dielectric behavior for cell sorting in microfluidic devices. She published 3 peer-reviewed journal publications from her graduate work and also filed a patent for a handheld dielectrophoresis device to analyze blood samples. In addition to research, while at MTU Dr. Adams was actively involved with the Center for Diversity and Inclusion and worked as Outreach Coordinator. In this role she provided underrepresented minority students academic support through a tutoring program she developed. Dr. Adams is committed to helping increase diversity in STEM as well as advancing stem cell research, which motivated her decision to join Dr. Lisa Flanagan’s lab as a postdoctoral researcher at UCI. Here she studies the dielectric and differentiation properties of neural stem and progenitor cells for stroke therapeutics using microfluidic technology. Dr. Adams is active in a variety of professional organizations including the National Society of Black Engineers, the Society of Women Engineers (2016-2018 SWE Magazine Editorial Board), and the AES Electrophoresis Society (2017 Annual Meeting Organizer).

Dr. Lee Cabatingan has conducted extensive ethnographic research in Cuban and Anglophone Caribbean courts, including long term fieldwork at a newly established regional tribunal in Trinidad & Tobago, where she analyzed the Court’s complex relationship to region-formation. In her current project, Dr. Cabatingan seeks to explore how public debates over race, crime, and (under)development in Trinidad challenge classic theories of sovereignty. She hopes that this research will lead to a rethinking of the relationship between law and sovereignty and allow for a globally southern perspective to find a voice amongst predominantly globally northern theories. Dr. Cabatingan received her Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Chicago, where she held a Mellon Foundation Fellowship during her final year. Prior to that, she worked as a litigator in San Francisco after receiving a J.D. from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She earned her A.B. from Princeton University.

Where are they now: Dr. Lee Cabatingan is an Assistant Professor in Crimonology, Law, and Society at UCI.

Dr. Constance Iloh

University of Southern CaliforniaDoctor of Philosophy in Urban Education Policy, 2015

Dr. Constance Iloh is an education scholar committed to advancing understanding of the changing landscape of higher education and its impact on underrepresented students. Her research addresses two primary areas: (1) privatization in higher education, and (2) equity, access, and the experiences of underserved students in postsecondary education. Iloh has published several research articles focusing on student experiences and institutional practices at for-profit universities and community colleges. Most recently, she published a study on for–profit and community college choice in Teachers College Record. She earned a master’s degree in business management from Wake Forest University and a PhD in urban education policy from the University of Southern California, Rossier School of Education. Prior to notification of her selection as a UC Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Iloh was offered and accepted a position as an assistant professor of higher education at the University of California, Irvine School of Education. As a result of receiving the prestigious UC Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Program Fellowship, she will delay her faculty appointment for one year.
In addition to maintaining a productive research agenda, Iloh’s expertise has been sought after in numerous scholarly and policy arenas. She has served as an invited speaker for the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African Americans, the Hammer Museum, the Institutional Design Frontiers Summit, the Education Credit Management Corporation, the African American Policy Forum, and numerous colleges and universities. Iloh has also been quoted and had her research featured in popular outlets such as The Chronicle of Higher Education, National Public Radio (NPR), Inside Higher Ed, and Diverse Issues in Higher Education – who headlined her as a “Higher Ed Powerhouse.” Dr. Iloh’s research, publications, and media can be found on her website: www.constanceiloh.com.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic:
When Higher Education Grows Up: Towards a New Understanding of College Pathways for Adult Students

Where are they now: Dr. Constance Iloh is an Assistant Professor in the School of Education at UCI.

2015-2016

Dr. Maria Patrice Amon

University of California, IrvineDoctor of Drama, 2014

Maria Patrice Amon is a recent PhD in drama from the University of California, Irvine. Her dissertation is titled “Little Girls and Legal Defendants: Theatricalization and Performances of Innocence in Modern American Culture.” She is a dramaturg and has worked with San Diego Rep and Clairemont Act One. Maria Patrice holds a Juris Doctorate from California Western School of Law.

Where are they now: Dr. Patrice Amon is a Dramaturg and Producer in Residence at San Deigo Repertory Theater. Dr. Amon is also a Lecturer at San Deigo State University in the Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies.

Dr. Shandee Dawn Dixon

University of Michigan Medical SchoolDoctor of Microbiology & Immunology, 2012

Dr. Dixon attended Pasadena City College where she joined the Bridges to the Baccalaureate program. This allowed her to transition into the Minority Biomedical Research Support-Research Initiative for Scientific Enhancement (MBRS-RISE) Program at California State University Los Angeles where she earned a Bachelor’s degree in microbiology and master’s degree in biology as a graduate fellow in MBRS–RISE M.S to Ph.D. During this tenure, she worked full time in a virology research lab and served as the Student Advisory committee Biology representative. Dr. Dixon earned her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan where her dissertation project focused on iron acquisition mechanisms in Bacillus anthracis giving her the opportunity to learn a range of techniques spanning drug discovery, genetic engineering, and microbial pathogenesis, along with extensive experience working with murine and tissue culture models of infection. After completing her dissertation, she began postdoctoral training in Prof. Ken Bradley’s lab at University of California, Los Angeles. This appointment expanded her knowledge of bacterial pathogenesis and cell biology by exploring how an emerging family of bacterial toxins gains access into human cells to cause disease. Skills acquired by Dr. Dixon in both graduate school and during her first postdoctoral appointment at UCLA have laid the groundwork for her to succeed in her current postdoctoral position in Prof. Celia Goulding’s lab at the University of California, Irvine. Her diverse scientific training puts her in a unique position to facilitate a microbiological context to the findings of a lab focused on the protein chemistry of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Currently Dr. Dixon aims to explore the utility of a recently discovered bacterial microcompartment, Encapsulin, in Mycobacterium tuberculosis as a novel therapeutic and vaccine delivery nano–vehicle to combat intracellular infections including TB. In addition to the honor of being named a UCI Chancellor’s Fellow, she is a 2015 award winner of the Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship. Her postdoctoral training at UCI will focus on cultivating skills that will bolster her passion of mentoring other aspiring scientists. Complementing expertise at the bench and interest in biomedical sciences with development as a productive mentor and communicator has been a unifying theme throughout Dr. Dixon’s research.

Where are they now: Dr. Shandee Dixon is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU).

Dr. Nathan S. Garcia, 2013-2014 and 2014-2015

University of Southern CaliforniaDoctor of Philosophy in Biology, 2012

Dr. Nathan Garcia’s interest in the biological consequences of global change began as an undergraduate at Michigan State University where he graduated with honors in Fisheries and Wildlife and Spanish. He subsequently earned a master’s degree in Marine Biology at the College of Charleston and later a PhD in Marine Environmental Biology at the University of Southern California. The implications of global warming on oceanic nutrient chemistry, microbial diversity, and web interactions and food web interactions animate his on-going research and scientific papers. In addition to advancing his research program, Dr. Garcia is looking forward to contributing to the UCI chapter of the California Alliance for Minority Participation in Science (C.A.M.P.). Motivating and mentoring future science students has been an integral part of his graduate career. In a NSF funded program at the College of Charleston, he not only worked one-on-one with a range of student learners from elementary, middle school, to high school, but also developed inquiry-based science lesson plans in collaboration with teachers in seven area schools.

Where are they now: Dr. Nathan S. Garcia is a Postdoctoral Associate in Microbial Ecology at Duke University.

2014-2015

Dr. Laura E. Enriquez

University of California, Los AngelesDoctor of Philosophy in Sociology, 2014

Dr. Enriquez earned undergraduate degrees in Sociology and History from Pomona College. During her time there she began working closely with undocumented immigrant students and researching issues related to undocumented immigrant communities. Earning her Masters and Doctoral degrees at the University of California, Los Angeles, she has researched, presented, and published on a range of issues related to the educational, economic, political, and social experiences of undocumented young adults who immigrated to the United States as children. Putting her research into practice, she works directly with colleges and community organizations to help them better serve undocumented immigrants. Additionally, she is a contributing blogger at the Huffington Post and participates in community-based workshops and panels to raise awareness about undocumented immigrant issues.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic:
For Love and Papers: Latina/o Family Formation in the Shadows of Immigration Policy

Mentor:
Professor Rubén Rumbaut

Department, School:
Department of Sociology, School of Social Sciences

Where are they now: Dr. Laura Enriquez is an Assistant Professor in Chicano/Latino Studies at UCI.

Dr. Joseph Morales

University of California, BerkeleyDoctor of Philosophy in Ethnic Studies, 2012

Dr. Joseph Morales is interested in the intersections of race and religion, Chicano/Latino literary and cultural studies, and colonial/postcolonial theory. Dr. Morales’ research is informed by his own progression as a first-generation and low-income student. His work seeks to reimagine the questions of how, by whom, and for whom “knowledge” is produced. Starting his educational path at a California community college, Dr. Morales later earned a bachelor’s degree in Spanish and Religious Studies at University of California, Santa Barbara, a master’s degree in Divinity from the University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in Ethnic Studies from University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Morales’ research is focused on the politics of organizing and disseminating information, including race-based forms of cultural nationalism, especially as it relates to the critical study of religion. His current project examines how religion and spirituality has contributed to the formation of Latina/o literature; and also engages debates connected with digital humanities, Latina/o migrant politics, and Black-Latina/o struggles for social justice.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic:
The Politics of “Ethnic” Archives and Databases

Where are they now: Dr. Joseph Morales is Assistant Director for Strategic Initiatives and Partnerships in the Office of Inclusive Excellence.

Dr. Philip Tanedo

Cornell UniversityDoctor of Philosophy in Physics, 2013

Dr. Philip “Flip” Tanedo’s research in theoretical high energy physics focuses on the underlying particle properties of dark matter, hypothetical ideas such as supersymmetry and extra dimensions, and the interplay of experimental efforts to test these ideas. Flip received his Ph.D in physics from Cornell University as an NSF Graduate Research fellow and Soros fellow. Prior to that, he completed master’s degrees from Durham University and Cambridge University as a Marshall scholar and a Bachelors of Science with honors & distinction from Stanford University as a Goldwater scholar. As part of his efforts to explore new media for science outreach, he was a writer for the US/LHC (now part of Quantum Diaries) blog and has recently founded the ParticleBites blog.

Chancellor’s ADVANCE Postdoctoral Fellowship Research Topic:
Dark Matter and new physics at the Large Hadron Collider

Where are they now: Dr. Philip Tanedo is an Assistant Professor of Physics at UC Riverside.

Dr. Jaye Austin Williams

University of California, IrvineDoctor of Philosophy in Drama, 2013

Dr. Williams is an artist-scholar and recent graduate of UC Irvine’s Ph.D. Program in Drama. For nearly thirty years prior to her return to school, Jaye worked as a critically acclaimed stage director, actor, playwright and cultural consultant on and off Broadway and regionally. Among her credits are the regional premieres of David Auburne’s Proof and Suzan-Lori Parks’ Topdog/Underdog. She is a recipient of numerous fellowships and awards, including from the National Endowment for the Arts, Manhattan Theatre Club, and the Kennedy Center. Her research frames the ways in which Black playwrights examine blackness as not only a locus of cultural identity and expression, but also as a condition and predicament warranting closer and ongoing critical analysis. Jaye will join the faculty in the Department of Theatre Arts at California State University Long Beach in the Fall of 2015.

Dr. Miller earned honors undergraduate degrees in both Physics and Astronomy from the University of Texas at Austin. As a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford, she pursued observational astrophysics with a special interest in galaxy assembly and dark matter. Since completing her doctorate in astrophysics, Dr. Miller has continued her research and publishing activity on the evolution of matter in the universe as a joint postdoctoral fellow at UC Riverside and Caltech. In Texas and England as well as in California, she has been engaged in educational outreach to underserved communities and in mentoring students from underrepresented populations. Dr. Miller is writing and hosting a science promotional series called Beyond. She is also currently producing a collection of short videos called Phys-kicks. These series, which will feature scientists who break the mold of typical stereotypes, are designed to de-mystify natural phenomenon (like dark energy or black holes) while encouraging children, teens, and adults to believe that physics is completely within their reach.